


Possible Service Disruption

by entanglednow



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Cell Phones, Gen, Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-07-19
Updated: 2012-07-19
Packaged: 2017-11-10 08:19:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,533
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/464169
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/entanglednow/pseuds/entanglednow
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Stiles seemed to think that Derek's sharply worded request to let him know what was going on had been some sort of free pass to bug the shit out of him whenever he wanted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Possible Service Disruption

 

It started with the phone.

Derek had never given Stiles his phone number, he'd had no reason to, and he had no idea when exactly he'd ended up with it. He had to assume that Scott must have shared it at some point, because he eventually got an angry phone call demanding to know where Scott was. That was the night Scott had managed to get himself kidnapped by hunters, mooning over Allison like an idiot and not paying attention. Or at least that was what Derek had assumed. Obviously Stiles had known it then. But that phone had been smashed to pieces when Derek fell off the top of a building. He'd hit the ground so hard there'd been nothing left but cracked pieces.

He didn't know how Stiles got the number of the second one either. Derek had owned it literally two days before he got a text asking whether zombies were real, which he ignored as aggressively as he could. The phone had been trashed a few weeks later. He'd taken it out of his pocket after a fight, and it just hadn't worked any more.

The third one he'd left in his car and forgotten about, until he'd been forced to drive Stiles home one night. He hadn't realised that stopping for gas was some sort of invitation, but apparently it was. Because he'd been out of the car for all of five minutes and when he got back Stiles was juggling both phones and a soda. Not looking sorry in the slightest about the invasion of privacy. Derek didn't exactly have to be a detective to know that he was going to have to put up with more phone calls, texts and bewildering picture messages than he knew what to do with - he went with his usual approach and just deleted 90% of it. Which made him feel better if nothing else. Because at least he wasn't _encouraging_ him.

That phone was run over by a truck.

The fourth phone he'd used to send Stiles a picture of an old grave full of strangely arranged animal bones. So he could find out what the hell it meant, and if it was something they needed to deal with. That wasn't an invitation either, no matter how much Stiles protested that it was later. That had been the frustrating week where Stiles was absolutely certain Scott had been cursed, and he would not shut the fuck up about it. Until Derek told him he would murder him if he didn't stop, and then turned his phone off. Of course Stiles had turned out to be right, and he'd had to deal with the whole thing mostly on his own. Which was one more screw-up for Derek to feel guilty about. Stiles had never let him forget it, and he'd deserved every angrily texted reminder and spoken reference to it.

That phone had been lost somewhere in the creek, when Derek had been dragged in by what Stiles had dubbed 'Jenny Greenteeth.' Stiles had lost his own phone pulling him out.

That was the point where Derek had caved and accepted that some sort of communication was necessary. Because Scott was constantly losing his phone, and the two of them together spent way too much time running off into the woods like they were born with their self-preservation instincts permanently turned off. Stiles seemed to think that Derek's sharply worded request to let him know what was going on had been some sort of free pass to bug the shit out of him whenever he wanted. But for the ten percent of information that was actually relevant Derek put up with the rest, grudgingly. It was a case of having to, because no amount of 'stop doing it' got through. He could only wish that 'stop doing it' ever made it through either of their skulls.

The fifth phone had been an overly advanced piece of shit. Which Derek had very nearly smashed to pieces. He'd been forced to give it to Stiles, just so he could make the damn thing work. Which he had. He'd also changed his ringtone to 'Hungry Like The Wolf,' and Derek didn't have the faintest idea how to make it _stop_. So he just put the fucking thing on vibrate permanently.

He was almost relieved when a stray bullet gutted the thing's electronics.

The sixth one was a cheap-ass piece of shit. He was in a hurry and he bought it from a gas station. Stiles didn't even attempt stealth on that one. He'd dug it out of Derek's jacket pocket, still talking a mile a minute about whatever Scott had managed to break, or get involved in, or fall in love with this week, and he'd sent himself a text message. Derek didn't even try and stop him, and he still had no idea why. Maybe part of him had understood the complete and total futility of it.

He genuinely had no idea what happened to that phone. It went missing some time around Halloween.

So now he was on phone number seven. He knew Stiles had the number because there was still a text on it Derek hadn't deleted yet, angrily demanding an explanation for Erica's latest tantrum. A text he'd ignored.

But it'd been four days since that, and there wasn't a single missed call, or message on his phone from Stiles. Derek knew that because he'd checked, he'd been checking every few hours, with a sort of irritating, mindless obsession that was slowly driving him insane. It was like a gnawing absence that used to be filled with noise and it was _wrong_.

He could have just gone to find out what had Stiles so distracted. He could have driven past the school, checked in with Scott. But even the idea of it left him grinding his teeth, and if he was a little harder in his training, a little more impatient, then no one mentioned it.

It wasn't until after nine, when Stiles showed up at the warehouse in one piece, not smelling like blood or death, that Derek recognised what had been driving him. Recognised it and bit down on it with an immediate, angry denial.

"Hey." Stiles nodded at him and didn't hurry, he just ambled his way closer.

"You didn't call," Derek said, which wasn't exactly a great conversation opener. But he wasn't a good conversationalist and he'd never bothered to try and be with Stiles.

Stiles blinked at him, brain knocked off its tracks. Which Derek knew from experience was relatively easy to do, but never lasted for very long.

"I - what?" Stiles shook his head like he had no idea what Derek was talking about.

Derek tipped his phone from one side to the other.

"You didn't call," he snapped out, angrier than he meant to be, than he wanted to admit to being.

There was a flicker of surprise, but it quickly turned into a frown.

"Oh, no, my phone was stolen. I've had the shittiest week, you have no idea." Stiles pushed a hand into his pocket, slipped out the shiny black-grey weight of a phone. "I got a new one and I was coming over to -" He stopped, and the corner of his mouth quirked upwards. "Were you worried about me?"

Derek ground his teeth, and Stiles made the most idiotic face Derek had ever seen. He had the instant, and barely resistible, urge to shake him, or worse. But he was too busy stamping on his anger, because it was true. He had been worried, and the horrible relief he was feeling right now didn't make anything better. It made everything considerably worse. Because this had been exactly what he'd been trying to avoid.

"No."

"That's - that's kind of amazingly and unexpectedly touching," Stiles said. As if his firmly delivered no had been the most obvious yes in the world.

Derek glared at him, then tugged his own phone out. "Not another word."

"Can't I at least get a minute to enjoy the moment? This is a new experience for me, I want to savour it."

He looked like he would as well, gleefully, and at Derek's expense.

"Shut up, I'm going to give you my number."

The expression on Stiles's face was definitely surprised then, and a little disbelieving.

"Really?"

The fact that it sounded so quietly genuine, as if he was honestly surprised that Derek would ever give him his number for free - it made him suddenly and uncomfortably aware of the fact that he'd been doing this whole thing wrong. That he'd been making everything hard when it had never needed to be.

"Yes."

Stiles eyed him carefully, as if to decide if he was actually serious. Before he was tapping his way through screens.

"I'm reading it once," Derek told him. "Don't screw it up."

Stiles gave him a flat, serious look, as if he couldn't believe Derek had even said that, as if he thought Derek didn't get it _at all_. Then it was gone, and he'd snorted and smiled like an idiot, waved his fingers in a universal 'come on, get on with it,' gesture.

 

 


End file.
